


Warm Me Up

by halloa_what_is_this



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Bathing, Fluff, M/M, Sickfic, and they flirt, and they kiss, taking care of each other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-10
Updated: 2014-01-10
Packaged: 2018-01-08 06:39:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1129496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/halloa_what_is_this/pseuds/halloa_what_is_this
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For days, it’s like living with a sick toddler craving for attention and entertainment. Sherlock stays close to John the whole time, climbs on top of him or next to him every time he sits or lies down and sleeps with his head buried in his stomach every night.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Warm Me Up

**Author's Note:**

> [Roxy](http://reichebach.tumblr.com/) is an angel for reading this, commenting on this and helping me come up with a name.
> 
> And [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b49S513FvBY) is the Chip 'n' Dale cartoon they were watching.
> 
> [Russian translation](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12425706) available.

In mid-March, just when they have began to prepare the parks for the summer and the fountains are back in business and full of cold, sparkling water, Sherlock slips on the single slimy stone someone has thrown in the bottom of one of the Italian fountains in Kensington Gardens. No matter what certain doctors might say about taking off your socks and shoes (especially when idiot detectives have already shown symptoms of viral infection) or stepping into a fountain to fish out evidence when the mercury is barely above zero, the said idiot detectives still have the tendency to jump in after throwing their socks and shoes at their doctor friend.

Sherlock slips, dives back first into the icy water and gets fantastically soaked. Any normal person would get out from the pool as fast as possible before freezing stiff, but Sherlock stays in until he finds the highly important piece of evidence they need to formally charge the man watching the show with Detective Inspector Lestrade, Sergeant Donovan and half of the Metropolitan Police force.

Most of the audience has wrinkles of laughter around their eyes and stupid smiles on their faces, Lestrade and Donovan are shaking with laughter so much that the criminal, who the latter is holding by the shoulder, is shaking slightly as well while looking incredulous that the soaked doofus trotting about in the fountain is the man who apparently will make sure he spends at least a decade in prison.

But John Watson looks at his flatmate with evident worry as well as slight anger in his eyes.

John Watson stands at the edge of the pool holding Sherlock’s shoes and socks in his hands, a very intrigued stork next to him. Both the stork and the doctor follow Sherlock’s rise out of the water with their neck joints stiff, moving their heads in sync, which makes Lestrade and Donovan laugh even harder.

Sherlock is shivering so hard with the cold John is sure he will get dry just from that.

But he will not take the risk.

He sets the socks and shoes on the edge of the pool, leaves the stork to guard them and drags Sherlock’s coat off of him. Sherlock's uncontrollable shaking makes him look like he is doing some weird dance. Between the clickety clack of his teeth he says that for once he could actually use the shock blanket the paramedics are usually so eager to provide.

No shock blanket in sight, John has no choice but to take off his own jacket and drape it over Sherlock’s wet back. He curses his smaller form but Sherlock doesn’t seem to mind that the coat barely covers his shoulders as he buries himself up to his nose inside it and keeps on shivering.

When John tries to remove the scarf, Sherlock starts shaking his head to stop him, though the shivering makes it look like a nervous tick.

“I never take it off at this time of year. It’s still too cold to go out without a scarf on.”

John stares.

“Sherlock, it’s dripping wet. You’re dripping wet! The scarf is not going to do you any good right now.”

Still, Sherlock refuses to let it be taken away from him.

So John turns to look for someone else to be angry with.

“If you are done ogling and giggling like school girls,” he yells over his shoulder, “you could actually do your job and arrest someone so that I can take this one home.”

He tosses Sherlock’s loot in the general direction of the bunch of constables gathered nearest to them and starts directing Sherlock towards the only civilian car on the park road. Behind him Lestrade groans. It’s his car and it’s new.

John knows this which is exactly why he is walking so briskly towards the shining Mercedes. Along with built-in navigation system and nappa leather interior, the car also has heated seats.

 

 

\\\

By the time they reach Baker Street, Sherlock has sneezed 57 times in rapid succession and bitten his tongue twice in the attempt of retelling John everything about the case while his teeth have continued to clack together with the cold. He has pulled his socks and shoes back on his icy feet and so he is not sloshing up the stairs to their flat but only clicking away harder than usual.

With the shivers and his patent leather shoes, Sherlock does sound like a tap dancer practicing for an upcoming performance.

“Oh dear,” Mrs Hudson comments from her doorway.

“Did he dive in again?” she asks John who has only stopped to apologise for the ruckus and the drops of water in the hallway.

“No, this time it actually was an accident.”

“He will catch his death,” she shakes her head. “It’s freezing outside.”

John kisses her cheek quickly, wishes her good night, promises that the tap dancing will end immediately and rushes after Sherlock.

 

 

He finds Sherlock in the bedroom. Which is cold. Because the window is open. Because Sherlock is an idiot.

John bangs the window shut. Sherlock has crashed on the bed, making it shake with his shivers and reminding John of the very uncomfortable scene in _The Exorcist_ he has tried to forget just to be able to sleep at night.

Sherlock is like a sack of potatoes lying on his stomach but John succeeds in manoeuvring him on his back, opening his trousers and shirt and dragging everything off. He manhandles Sherlock back on his stomach so he can get to the edge of the duvet and drape it over the shivering form.

 

 

The next morning, Sherlock has a sore throat, a raging fever and an incessant need to get out of bed. John stops his every attempt to get anywhere further away than to the toilet, which isn’t hard to accomplish considering how weak Sherlock is. However, John has to sit on his back for about fifteen minutes to tire him out when Sherlock is particularly eager to see why his phone (which John has hidden from him but forgotten to turn off) is ringing so.

“I bet it’s a triple murder!” Sherlock croaks under John. “Or a quadruple! Bloody quintuple homicide and you’re sitting on my bum and letting the idiots at the Yard try and solve it by themselves!”

“It’s all for your own good,” replies John, turning the page of the morning’s _Times_ he is browsing whilst his human seat keeps on waving and wriggling under him.

 

 

By late afternoon, Sherlock’s voice has gone hoarse and every drop of energy has drained out of him. He is lying on the bed with his arm slung over the edge.

“John, phone Mycroft. I need to see if I’ve remembered you in my will.”

John is standing at the door, leaning against the frame, watching Sherlock cough his lungs out. Mrs Hudson appears next to him, tuts and lowers the tea tray on the bedside table.

When Sherlock doesn’t even make an effort to thank her, she pats his hair and trots out of the room. She dismisses John’s apology of Sherlock’s rudeness with a quick wave of her hand and closes the door after her.

John returns to the poor patient slowly nearing his death on the bed. He brushes away the sweaty hair from the sweaty forehead and rests his hand on the sweaty neck. Sherlock lifts one sweaty hand to press a very sweaty handprint on John's jeans.

“Tea?” John asks.

Sherlock croaks.

 

 

At eleven, just when John is about ready to climb the stairs and go to bed, Sherlock emerges from his bedroom, dishevelled and dragging his dressing gown behind him. He stops in front of John, who pauses in turn and waits for what is to come.

He raises an eyebrow.

Sherlock looks like he is about to cry.

“What?” John asks gently.

Sherlock beeps.

Seriously, _beeps_.

John stares.

Then he smiles.

“Ah, I see.”

Sherlock’s lip trembles.

John takes his head between his hands.

“All I can do for you now is give you a friendly advice to go back to bed. You’re doing yourself no good walking about,” he looks down at Sherlock’s feet, “without any socks on. Jesus, Sherlock! It’s like you _want to_ stay ill!”

Sherlock shakes his head violently.

“Well then,” John pushes him back towards where he came from, “bed it is. I’ll bring you a bit more tea and a jug of water.”

 

 

At two, John wakes up to a feverish Sherlock climbing next to him to his bed. The whole man is radiating with warmth when he collapses half on top of John in his attempt to slide next to him gracefully. The bed is pushed against the wall and John sleeps on the door side of it, so the only way to the unoccupied side is over him.

John drags the covers from under Sherlock and drapes them over him. He feels his forehead and Sherlock whimpers.

“Stay there,” John tells him.

A hand shoots out from under the covers and clutches him painfully.

“I’m not going to leave you, just popping in the kitchen to get some stuff. Be right back,” John soothes the hand away from his forearm and strokes Sherlock’s hair.

Sherlock beeps.

  

John finds a bowl and a clean towel, fills the first with lukewarm water and places the latter into it to get it soaked. He retrieves the loot to his bedroom where the pile of sickness and dressing gown looks more like a miserable wet dog than a consulting detective.

The heap has been staring at the door, waiting for John to return, and if Sherlock had any energy and a tail, he’d be tapping it on the pillows in his joy of John’s reappearance.

Bowl on the bedside table, John starts to drag the moist towel over Sherlock’s brow and neck. Sherlock beeps again.

“I know, it’s not fun at all. I’m sorry.”

As a sign of agreement, Sherlock whimpers, sounding exactly like John’s aunt’s terrier after she got her tail stuck between the door hinges.

John wrings the towel again and slides it over Sherlock’s trembling jaw. Scooting down the bed, John gets back under the covers and puts the towel against Sherlock’s neck. He presses his hand on Sherlock's face to sooth the trembles away with his fingers.

A hum, something that for once sounds like Sherlock might be feeling comfort instead of burning grinding pain, comes from deep in Sherlock’s chest. His hands burrow into John’s t-shirt and John feels a sigh on his fingers. He keeps on patting the towel on Sherlock’s shoulder blades and jugular until the fingers radiating heat to his sternum go lax and Sherlock’s breathing has calmed down.

 

 

John wakes up several hours later with a horrendous need to pee. He is still clutching the towel and it’s slowly dripping into the mattress. Sherlock’s neck and the ends of his hair are soaking wet. He is sleeping as close to John as possible, one cold foot tucked between his thighs, the other under the waistband of his pyjama pants where it’s pressing against his bladder.

He tries to remove his hand very carefully from behind Sherlock’s head. Water drips down the towel on Sherlock’s cheek, and he mumbles in his sleep and rubs at his cheekbone with his fist, sighs and grabs his nose between forefinger and thumb.

Towel safely somewhere in the general vicinity of the door, John tries to remove Sherlock’s feet from his person, dealing first with the one giving him incontinence. He grasps Sherlock’s ankle lightly to drag it out of his pants.

Apparently, Sherlock is ticklish.

John gets a smart kick to his diaphragm and a punch to his nose when an elbow (thumb and forefinger still securely clutching the nose to get leverage) connects with his face.

Sherlock jumps up and stares down at John groaning with his face squashed into the pillows.

“Beep?” he asks.

“Owww,” answers John.

“Meep,” apologises Sherlock.

John breathes in and growls into the pillows, gathers himself and tries to get up once more.

Again, Sherlock clutches at him like a drowning man.

“I’m just going to the loo, Sherlock. Your cold foot has been playing toe tag with my bladder for god knows how long. If I don’t get up, I’m going to wet myself.”

He stumbles out of the bed, picking up the towel on his way.

When he returns to the bedroom, Sherlock has taken the hint and ransacked his sock drawer, apparently throwing all the useless ones anywhere but back in the closet. He is in bed once again, blankets cocooned around him so that only his nose is visible.

John dumps the socks covering the floor on the bottom of his closet. He climbs back to bed and peeks under the covers.

“Good choice,” he says to Sherlock’s wiggling toes. “My nana knitted those. The yarn has aloe vera in it.”

Sherlock hums appreciatively and pokes John on the nose with his toes. John catches them and tickles the spaces between each until Sherlock squirms.

“Breakfast,” the doctor orders. Sherlock makes a face and a noise through his nose.

“I’m glad you don’t sound like a broken microwave anymore. And if you ever want to function as a consulting detective again, you need to eat.”

The nose disappears.

“Yohoo, boys!” John hears Mrs Hudson’s slipper covered feet shuffling down the corridor. Her arm pokes around the corner and taps the wall.

“Come in, Mrs Hudson. Never mind the cocoon. He is in one of his moods.”

“Well, I’m sure this will cheer him up,” she says, presenting John with a breakfast tray full of porridge, eggs, toast and a huge pot of steaming tea.

They place everything on the bedside table and on the floor, and Mrs Hudson whispers into John’s ear, “I put a little something something in the tea, dearie. Makes him feel better every time he has a cold.”

She winks and is out of the room. John stares at the pot in his hands, lifts the top and sniffs. It smells like chamomile, it looks like chamomile and he dearly hopes the combination will fool Sherlock enough to make him drink it.

 

After the pot of mostly chamomile and a piece of toast partly shoved down his throat, Sherlock is snoring like a steam engine and drooling into John’s pillow.

John is going to get something very nice for Mrs Hudson for her birthday this year.

 

Downstairs, John checks his and Sherlock’s phones only to see they have 40 text messages, 7 of which are photos of Sherlock looking like an oversized bat standing in the pool, one particularly good one of his slip, arms flailing like windmill wings behind him (if that is not going on the notice board at the Yard, John will eat the aloe vera socks). There are also 5 unanswered calls, all from Lestrade and an answer phone message where a very repentant sounding Detective Inspector asks after Sherlock’s well-being and apologises for anything his police force might throw at them via text message or online.

Well, that ship has sailed, thinks John, after checking a few of the closer yarders' Facebook pages where the pictures of a consulting detective flying head first into the cold water has several thumb ups and even more comments.

John pockets his own phone with a sigh and returns Sherlock’s to its hiding place inside his chair (there is a hole in the upholstery under the seat).

 

 

Mrs Hudson’s mostly chamomile works and Sherlock only shuffles downstairs after several hours, during which John has had time to shower, shave and give the yarders a piece of his mind by writing the case down on his blog and reminding the idiots that Sherlock has once again solved a case for them and only gotten a pharyngitis for his pains. He is lying on the sofa watching telly when Sherlock trots through the door, trips on the loose belt of his dressing gown and lands on John. He has just enough energy to beep into John’s neck before he starts snoring again.

 _Thank you God for licit drugs_ , John thinks as he gathers Sherlock better into his lap.

 

 

\\\

Pharyngitis takes its time, keeping Sherlock’s throat inflamed and the man himself unable to speak. For days, it’s like living with a sick toddler craving for attention and entertainment. Sherlock stays close to John the whole time, climbs on top of him or next to him every time he sits or lies down and sleeps with his head buried in his stomach every night.

John tries to keep Sherlock’s brain occupied and suggests reading, which Sherlock accepts with minimum persuasion, but only if John reads out loud to him. This is established when the first page of _The Collected Works of Edgar Allan Poe_ is shoved in his face, followed by Sherlock's bony bum that falls painfully on his lap and cold hands that slither under his shirt.

“Sherlock - fingers - freezing - _off_!”

Sherlock answers by trying very hard to hide his toes in the warmth between cotton and skin as well.

 

 

On a morning, he has his voice back but still sounds more like Donald Duck.

“John?”

John tries to blink sleep out of his eyes and free his arms from where they are lodged under Sherlock, who does not move an inch to help him, but leans in when John places his hand on his forehead.

“I dreamt I was shipped straight to Duckburg and dating Daisy Duck.”

“Who?” quacks Sherlock.

“How is it that you still remember ‘Round and round the garden’ but have deleted the paramount talent of Clarence Nash?”

Sherlock looks bewildered. John takes pity.

“Right, so what do you want to do?”

After a night on the sofa clearly meant for just one but now occupied by a grown man with another very heavy one sleeping on top of him, no one is in the best of forms. Especially not an ex-soldier who trashes in his sleep and has a bad shoulder and a psychosomatic leg.

All in all, a Sherlock lying on top of one with his elbows poking into the other person's chest is not the most comfortable of things to feel first thing in the morning, but Sherlock is ill and John will humour him and let him stay where he is.

“I want to watch cartoons.”

Speaking of humouring.

“Sherlock, I didn't mean the Donald Duck comment as ---“

“It's not that, though I still don’t know who that is,” Sherlock sniffs. “That’s what Father used to do with me when I was ill.”

John blinks. Then he strokes Sherlock’s hair.

“What would your mum do?”

There’s a very sad, sickness filled smile on Sherlock’s mouth now that he has been given the chance to dwell in his childhood.

“She’d make me hot milk with honey and garlic,” he shudders, “tasted horrible, but helped.”

“And Mycroft?” John asks carefully.

“He’d be at school.”

John strokes Sherlock’s back with his left hand while the right stays on top of his head.

“And when he came home, he’d bring me dried ginger and cranberry-flavoured cough syrup.”

John could kiss Mycroft.

 

 

They don’t have broadband, so there are not many channels to choose from. Luckily, it’s childrens’ hour still, and they’re showing one of the Chip ‘n’ Dale classics. John is still on his back on the sofa with Sherlock on top of him, and when the squirrels jam Donald in the chimney with a rubber pancake, he makes them both shake with laughter.

Sherlock, however, looks bewildered.

“You indicated that I’m him, yes?” he points at the television screen. “Why is he not wearing pants?”

John bites his lip and hiccups.

Sherlock looks down.

“I’m wearing pants.”

John almost falls off the sofa, and has to hold on to the backrest to keep his balance.

“So you honestly never watched this when you were a child?” he asks after he has gathered himself enough to speak.

Sherlock crunches his nose.

“Might have. It was mostly the cat and the mouse who tried to kill each other.”

“Ah, Tom and Jerry! We’ll have to see what we can do about that.”

But other than Wile E. Coyote, the children’s hour is over and they go straight to reruns of Eastenders.

“Sorry.”

Sherlock sighs into his shirt. “No matter.”

The morning sun is shining straight into their sitting room and John is now feeling toasty and comfortable with both the luminous celestial body and Sherlock’s sleep-and-sickness-softened form warming him. Sherlock’s knees fit perfectly between his thighs, and John’s belly, deliciously softened by the past months’ consumption of Mrs Hudson’s fruit cakes and biscuits, is the perfect pillow for Sherlock’s chin.

Still, John is in desperate need of a toothbrush and a shower. His tongue tastes like cat pee, and when he rubs his head he grimaces at the icky feeling of unwashed hair.

“I should take a shower.”

“So should I,” Sherlock says half asleep.

He scowls when John begins to collect his limbs and shuffle away. He starts towards the bathroom, Sherlock behind him like a shadow.

“Where are you going?” John asks.

“To take a shower.”

“I’m not taking you with me. The bathtub is small as it is. It will not fit two grown men.”

 

 

It does.

Especially when Sherlock lifts his feet up to rest them on the edge next to John’s head. John doesn’t quite know what do with his hands, so he places them on his stomach and closes his eyes.

He knows Sherlock is staring at him but it is so nice just to concentrate on the warm bath water rather than to find out what Sherlock is seeing on him now.

“I think we should be lovers.”

It’s amazing what he will come up with to get John’s attention.

“Why do you think that?”

There is a hand on his thigh and he is still not opening his eyes.

“Because you are warm. Because you take care of me. No one has done that since Mummy and Father and since Mycroft got fat and turned into an intolerable arse.”

“Mrs Hudson takes care of you,” John mumbles into the bath water, raising bubbles to the surface. He feels the hand on his stomach, fingers poking at his.

“She’s an old lady. I’m not going to be an old lady’s lover.”

“I’m not that young myself.”

“You are young enough.”

“Why ta very much. And when I get older, you’re going to leave me and find someone younger?”

The fingers wind together with his.

“I would never leave you.”

 

 

\\\

While Sherlock is drying his hair, John starts a fire and makes them more tea. They camp on a blanket in front of the fireplace and start a 5000 piece puzzle since Cluedo is still off the table and stabbed to the wall. Sherlock has a packet of tissues next to him and he is hiding them in his sleeves and down his shirt as he sneezes his way through the packet. John is busy collecting the edges and doesn't pay much attention to how Sherlock’s shirt front is starting to look a bit questionable.

“John?”

“Hmm?”

Sherlock snatches an edge and places it on his side of the blanket where he has been building the upper half of Van Gogh’s self-portrait.

“Since we are now lovers, we should play this game naked.”

John glances up from the several pieces of Vincent’s jaw he has found.

“What, like strip poker? Who finds a fitting piece first gets to decide which item the other takes off?”

“If you want. Or we could take a shortcut and you could just take your clothes off now since I’d beat you anyway.”

John steals several pieces from Sherlock’s pile and attaches them to Vincent’s beard.

“You sure about that?” he smirks.

Several crumpled tissues fall to the floor.

“Sherlock, I was joking! Don’t take off your shirt, you’re still ill!”

 

 

\\\

They curl up in John’s bed (Sherlock uses the nostalgia card again and says the sheets remind him of the ones they had at home and that they make him feel less ill), and John reluctantly agrees to be naked if Sherlock in turn promises to keep his clothes on.

“You should be naked more often,” Sherlock kisses John’s collarbone.

“In your dreams,” John answers with a sigh.

“Yees,” Sherlock purrs.

It is not too bad, John admits, being naked under covers with a human radiator and having long violinist’s fingers stroking your hipbone. But when Sherlock’s toes go to his stomach, John exhales,

“Unbelievable. Your feet are still cold.”

“I’ll just have to put them between your legs to warm them up.”

“Don’t you dare. I have the upper hand here. This is still rightfully my bed, and I can kick you out whenever I please.”

The icy feet slither between his thighs. He presses his legs together tightly, and Sherlock’s big toe gets stuck.

“Don’t be troublesome, John. I’m sick and cold and will never get better if you won’t help.”

“My crotch is not your personal heater,” John crumbles and takes his book from the bedside table. Anything to distract himself from Sherlock’s icy fingers that are exploring his waist. “You are welcome to use my bed if it makes you feel better, but keep your frosty body parts away from my private bits.”

Sherlock snarls, sticks his head under the blankets and pokes his cold nose somewhere where it has no business being. John howls.

“They say sex is a very good cure for cold,” he hears Sherlock mumble under the blanket.

“Thank you, but no thank you. I am not getting intimate with Frosty the Snowman,” John answers, finding the right page and throwing his bookmark on the bump that is Sherlock’s head.

He screams again when Sherlock bites his stomach.

 

 

\\\

The next morning, Sherlock’s throat hurts.

“John. My throat hurts.”

“Yes, I heard you the first ten times. What can I do? You refuse to take any medication and choose to just lie there, moaning and moping and once again _you are not wearing any socks_.”

“Socks are evil,” Sherlock mumbles into the pillow. He has stolen one of John’s from his bed and refuses to let it go. It smells of John, it’s comforting. He also refuses to go back to bed because he is being a child and, like socks, sleep is evil. And John, the doctor and responsible adult that he is, will not join him to engage in any activities other than sleep.

So Sherlock nestles into the sofa, almost hiding himself in the dusty space between the back rest and the cushions. John looms over him, trying to decide whether he should sneak to see Mrs Hudson and ask her for more of the mostly-chamomile tea and risk Sherlock getting suspicious of why John would not make tea from their own supplies which he knows to be plenty.

“Why does it hurt, John?”

“That’s pharyngitis for you, mate.”

“It didn’t hurt yesterday.”

“That’s because you were getting better and then threw it all away because you can’t shut up if your throat is not welded shut.”

Sherlock rolls over.

“Then give me something to think about so I won’t have to talk out of boredom.”

“You would only mutter to yourself anyway,” John sits down on the edge of the sofa and feels Sherlock’s throat.

“Then kiss me! I promise I’ll be quiet,” Sherlock pleads and purses his lips.

John presses his mouth against Sherlock’s forehead instead, not quite a kiss, and the expression on Sherlock’s face is priceless. He looks like a disappointed grayling.

“Is it my runny nose?” Sherlock sniffs. “That I sneeze on you in bed? Or have you never actually loved me?”

John leans in again.

_Oh, that’s nice, eyelid kissing is nice._

“I promise you,” says John and drapes a blanket over Sherlock’s chilly toes, “that I will both love you _and_ kiss you as much as you like when you’re healthy again.”

Sherlock looks like an emotionally crushed fish again.

“So it’s no kisses and no loving until I’m better?”

John looks positively wolfish.

“There’s several kinds of loving,” he says in Sherlock’s ear, “and for now it’s the nanny kind: soup, thermometer, more bedtime stories and herbal tea. But I promise to give you the best kind when you are physically in shape to actually take it.”

Sherlock gulps.

 

 

\\\

Sherlock ceases to talk and move altogether and gets better in record time. He is rewarded with kisses and a case, which he attends with a slightly under-the-weather John. It is flu season after all, and half of the Metropolitan police force (the better half this time) has taken ill and even Sally Donovan is happy to see Sherlock and John on the crime scene which proves out to be a very tricky one with such a few officers. She also sees the telltale signs of John’s cold approaching from the way the man nurses his throat by pulling his shoulders up and sniffs every once in a while.

When the inevitable sneeze comes, Donovan turns around to offer some kind of condolences. Sherlock beats her to it, though. He has taken off his scarf and is winding it around John’s neck.

Her jaw drops.

Sherlock is leaning in and saying something in John’s ear, while his fingers brush the lobe which is almost covered by the scarf. John flips Sherlock’s nose and kisses it for good measure.

_He kissed the freak’s nose._

Somehow Lestrade has sneaked his way next to her when she hasn’t been looking, and so she jumps to high heavens when he yells,

“Oi, you two! Stop that before Sally sprains something!”

Without turning, John screams back (and he most definitely has the same early symptoms of laryngitis Perkins took sick leave for),

“Don’t worry, he’s just working you up for what happened last time.”

Sherlock covers John’s barely visible mouth with his hand.

“This is only a flatmate showing concern for the other’s well-being.”

 _Flatmates_ _don’t kiss each other’s noses._

Nor do they bite them, but Sherlock still attaches his teeth to John’s face.

  
  
“I told you leaving your scarf home at this time of year is dangerous.”

“Shut up. I don’t even own a scarf.”

“And you’re a doctor!” Sherlock exclaims in mock horror.

John burrows deeper into Sherlock’s scarf, trying to look as sick and hurt as possible so Sherlock will kiss him again.

“Those miserable theatrics don’t work with me,” says Sherlock and kisses John anyway.

“Just solve this one fast so we can go home and you can start nursing me back to health,” comes a mutter from underneath the scarf.

Sherlock smirks evilly.

“You’ve already solved it, haven’t you? Then what are we still doing here?” John whines pitifully.

“Like you said, working people up. I rather like being affectionate with you in public since it has twofold advantage while doing it at home only has the one. Don’t worry! A while more and I’ll stroll over there, take a look at the corpse and dazzle everyone with my magical deduction abilities, and then we can go home and start the nursing.”

John doesn’t look nearly as flabbergasted as he should.

“Oh, you wicked, wicked man,” he sighs leaning against Sherlock’s chest. “Just amaze them fast as you can. I can’t feel my fingers.”

“That’s only because you forgot your gloves as well,” Sherlock retorts with no mercy. He picks John’s fingers up from where they’ve been slithering inside his coat between the buttons and breathes warmth on them.

“Lestrade is getting impatient,” John sneaks a peek at the Detective Inspector who is clearly still over the moon for what is happening between the two of them, but would still like Sherlock to “detach himself from John and get his arse over here to look at the not-so-attractive but oh-so-important stiff so we can all go home!”

“Let him fume for a while more,” Sherlock nips John’s pinkie. “At least he is warm.”


End file.
